Ebola followup NEW!

In article <4elafv$1rn at panix.com>, iayork at panix.com (Ian A. York) wrote:
> In article <hasse-2901962357370001 at hasse.dialup.access.net>,
> Hans Andersson <hasse at panix.com> quoted:
> >Ebola, like other RNA viruses, has an error-prone replication process,
> >which would boost the frequenzy of mutations and thus the emergence of new
> >strains. Sanchez says that the high mutation rate increases the chance
> >that the disease could someday adapt a more contagious form."
>> Which is equally true for *every other RNA virus around*, of course, and
> there are thousands - hundreds of thousands or millions - of them.
> Including such things as influenza virus, which killed, 20,000,000 (that's
> twenty million) people in one winter (European Journal of Epidemiology.
> 10(4):455-8, 1994); but of course that's not an Exciting
> New Virus that kills people in Excitingly Photgenic Ways, is it, so we
> won't worry about that at all.
>> Come on, Hans, think a little, would you?
>> Ian
>
Ian.
I just thought a little and this is the result:
I believe that health authorites all around the world, including CDC, have
their eyes on the possibility of a new and more lethal influenza virus
strain. There's two chapters about it in Stephen Morse's "Emerging
Viruses" and many others have brought up this concern. There's also
international research, surveillance and prevention efforts for that
possibility.
Joshua Lederberg are discussing "the resurgence of a 1918-like flu
pandemic", and other threats, in his article "Infection Emergent" in last
weeks JAMA.
This is what he says about Ebola:
"There is an outside chance of a zoonosis like Ebola escaping more
broadly, with increasing adaption to person-to-person spread, and perhaps
some muting of mortality that would keep the virus from burning out before
it spread further."
JAMA, Vol. 275, No.3, Jan. 17, 1996, p. 244 (Editorial)
It wasn't Joshua Lederberg who said that we shouldn't cover a
"hypothetical mutation scenario" or that he "do not want to see money
thrown at Ebola". It was
you, Ian - and you're wrong! ("Re: The return to The Hot Zone", Jan. 18, 1996)
Hans
--Hans Andersson, NYC
hasse at panix.com